Using admission lotteries to estimate heterogeneous effects of elite schools

Hessel Oosterbeek, Nienke Ruijs, Inge de Wolf

Research output: Working paper / PreprintDiscussion paper

Abstract

This paper studies the effects of enrollment in an elite school on students’ achievement. We use that elite schools in Amsterdam are often oversubscribed and admission is based on lotteries. Our results show that elite schools have negative effects on achievement of students who just qualify for the highest academic track and positive effects on achievement of students from the top of the baseline ability distribution. These results reconcile contrasting findings from previous studies that use regression discontinuity designs. We also find that value-added estimates of the effects of elite schools are severely biased.
Original languageEnglish
Place of PublicationAmsterdam
PublisherTinbergen Institute
Number of pages37
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 19 Apr 2020

Publication series

SeriesTinbergen Institute Discussion Paper Series
Number2020-018/V
SeriesROA External Reports

JEL classifications

  • i21 - Analysis of Education
  • i24 - Education and Inequality
  • c26 - Single Equation Models: Single Variables: Instrumental Variables (IV) Estimation

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